This feels politically coherent: it strikes a populist chord, but just furthers the rent-seeking interests in the area. It's of the same ilk as NIMBYism, but this time, it's a different form of rent.
Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
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Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#92A place that I worked (not in the bay area) had a cafeteria where employees could eat one meal for free per workday by using a meal ticket. They also cut deals with nearby restaurants so the meal tickets could be used as basically $5 vouchers at the restaurants. That seemed like an OK compromise. Not sure how it worked behind the scenes.
Why should there even be a "compromise"? My employer gives me free health care. Should that be restricted so I have to spend my own dollars and not get the benefit of a group plan? Should employers not be allowed to give a transit subsidy because it hurts Lyft/Uber? Maybe tech companies should not be allowed to offer stock based compensation because it's unfair to other city residents who work jobs without such thing…
My employer gives me free health care.
Your health care is not “free” it’s part of your compensation where the employer gets to choose how you’re compensated. I get healthcare via my wife’s insurance and I would much rather have the money.
In a sane society, your health care wouldn’t be tied to your employer.
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#93This reminds me of WeWork's company-wide ban of meat for employees.
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#94My bet is that it makes no difference. FB workers are rich, and they'll not want to eat every day in the caf, and they'll be out and about as much as they would otherwise. The alternative won't be 'restos' it will be 'the microwave'.
It's going to make a huge difference in terms of FB's appeal to potential employees. Who wants to work at FB if it means that you'll have to waste time and energy figuring out what to do for lunch every day?
I dont think that's considered a deal breaker for most people, or even a major consideration
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#95These cities really are trying their hardest to kill their golden goose.
Yeah, really. Big tech companies, come down here to Texas. With your well-above-market-average salaries and free food.
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#96This is very interesting for me for a very different reason: We're in Germany where this is taxed heavily. If you offer your employees free meals, this becomes part of their taxable income, so you actually have to give them a raise to even this out, and then you have employees that want to opt-out to get the hands on that cash... I always wondered how Google Germany deals with this. There is a minimum below which it…
What I’ve learned early: tax law is subject to negotiation. Depending how well your tax department connects and negotiates with the responsible tax office you can structure things like that.
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, if your employer is giving you $10k worth of meals (their cost to produce them) and charging you $100 for it, you are taxable on the $9,900 benefit.
I don't think it works like that. Do employees today get taxed on the value of the free food ? Why would that be different if it costs 1$ , and how do you define the value of the free food anyways ?
It's technically compensation, so why wouldn't it be taxable?
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#98> The ban wouldn't be retroactive, however, so on-site food at companies like Google and Twitter would still be available
Cool, so start-ups lose a potential hiring perk to the incumbents.
(Does anyone know the story behind this bill? Which politicians and restaurants supported it? I’d like to avoid the latter going forward.)
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#99My bet is that it makes no difference. FB workers are rich, and they'll not want to eat every day in the caf, and they'll be out and about as much as they would otherwise. The alternative won't be 'restos' it will be 'the microwave'.
It's going to make a huge difference in terms of FB's appeal to potential employees. Who wants to work at FB if it means that you'll have to waste time and energy figuring out what to do for lunch every day?
They could just offer paid cafeterias like Microsoft does.
Re: Bay Area cities are cracking down on free food at tech companies
#100This is one of the most stupid policy I have ever seen in the bay area (and there are a lot of stupid ones over here). As much as I dislike some of the big tech cos and the TechBros working there bragging about the free food all the time, I still believe a company should be able to decide if they want to offer food or not. Restaurants were unable to turn a profit, so they lobbied successfully and now everyone beside…
To be fair, it's not quite 'economy 101'. Or rather, 'economy 101' is that anyone with enough leverage, will use monopoly powers in one area, to take control of an adjacent economy. American Oil empires were not built on some new amazing way to get at oil, it was because some had control of the railroads, and charged their competitors a little more to transport therefore putting them out of business (through aggressi…
> an alternative could be 'they buy up all the restaurants in the area and make them exclusively available for FB staff'.
If Facebook is willing to pay substantial amounts of money for a restaurant, while at the same time guaranteeing customers to those who refuse to sell, it would seem the number of public restaurants in the area will explode.